Baby born with rare defect on long road to recovery

Theo was born Nov. 5 at South Miami Baptist and quickly transferred to St. Nicklaus Children's Hospital in Miami. He has an extremely rare heart condition, as well as a cleft palate and lip.

WENDY VICTORA @WendyVnwfdn

FORT WALTON BEACH — More than three weeks after being born, tiny Theo Hartrick's mom has only been able to hold him once.

Theo was born Nov. 5 at South Miami Hospital and quickly was transferred to Nicklaus Children's Hospital in Miami. He has an extremely rare heart condition as well as a cleft palate and lip.

"We have barely been able to make contact with the little dude, and he's only met his mother and father as well as his aunt who housed us through this," said his dad, Tyler Hartrick, who is from Fort Walton Beach.

Hartrick and his fiancée, Micheleen Casey, were told early in her pregnancy that their baby had a heart abnormality as well as the facial abnormalities. They were referred to a high-risk fetal maternal doctor who immediately asked if they wanted to keep their son.

"Both of us knew that he had a shot at life without having to suffer, so we immediately shot down the abortion suggestion," Hartrick said.

They went to Miami to meet a pediatric cardiologist who is renowned in his field and then moved there for the last six weeks of Casey's pregnancy to prepare for her delivery.

"During that time we were told lots of things, like he was in the 1st percentile (for size) ... he could possibly be stillborn ... and many more things," Hartrick told the Daily News.

A month before her due date, she went into labor and had to have a cesarean section.

Theo made his entry into the world screaming and weighed in at 4 pounds, 7 ounces, which was much larger than they had been told to expect. At 3 days old he had his first surgery, which is when doctors discovered his heart condition was even rarer than anticipated, found in just 1 in 200 million births.

He still faces three to five heart surgeries, as well as operations on his cleft and lip palate.

Friends have started a youcaring.com fund for Theo and his parents.

His maternal grandmother, Angie Hartrick of Destin, has only been able to see her grandson in photographs. She said she's impressed with his parents and how they have handled the challenges facing them in recent months.